A handful of forces appear to be shaping a year to come that is likely to include numerous device launches featuring the fledgling Android operating system.
Whether that will spell success for the license-free, Linux-based, open source OS is far from assured, though at least one forecast is decidedly rosy: In-Stat is forecasting a neck-and-neck open-source OS race between Symbian and Android within three years.
Meanwhile, news came Friday, courtesy of CNet News, that the Kogan Agora and Agora Pro smartphones running Android and due to launch in Australia by month’s end will be delayed indefinitely. (Poor display quality was cited and it is not immediately clear who actually makes the phone for Aussie-based Kogan Technologies.)
HTC Corp., which delivered the first and only Android-based handset, the G1, to T-Mobile USA Inc. last year, is keeping mum on its next such endeavor.
T-Mobile’s spokesman Peter Dobrow said “there are more great things to come,” but the carrier isn’t commenting (yet) on future Android-powered devices or services.
Growth drivers
First off, smartphones remain a growth area in an otherwise faltering handset picture this year. And that underscores the application angle.
The ability to attract application developers with the promise of write-once, run-anywhere opportunities and get consumers jazzed about revenue-generating data services is perhaps foremost of the forces loose this year, analysts say.
That will drive network operator support for fewer handset platforms, but will that support fall in Android’s direction or a new, open Symbian OS’s direction? Or do Apple Inc. and Research In Motion Ltd. have the inside track on the application angle? The year unfolding may well provide answers.
Handset vendors are being driven to cut costs and, certainly, a license-free OS offers opportunity. And the
Open Handset Alliance backing – collaborating, if the OHA model is to be believed – Android includes Samsung, LG, HTC, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, Huawei, Toshiba, Asus and Garmin. Motorola and Sony Ericsson have touted their interest in Android – in the face of deteriorating fortunes and stagnant portfolios – as one of their strategies to effect turnarounds. Lenovo has touted its nascent “OPhone,” based on Android, for the potentially lucrative Chinese market, although that handset would run only on a TD-SCDMA network.
Samsung in particular has the scale and market position – second only to Nokia Corp., which will likely stick with Symbian – to give Android a serious push, according to Jim McGregor, chief technology strategist at In-Stat.
“If ‘we’ get it right, the open-source trend has a chance to be game-changing,” McGregor said. “We’re expecting Android-related rollouts throughout the year, though that could change due to global economics. Samsung is the one to watch, both in the United States and internationally. The LiMo Foundation is also in this dog fight. There’s a billion-unit pot of gold out there and everyone wants a piece of it.”
Open source, business models
“One of the critical elements of the wireless ecosystem going forward is Internet connectivity,” McGregor said.
The operating system is an enabler, but you’ve got to have an appealing, easy-to-use, user interface and powerful browser on top of the OS, the analyst said. Android and other Linux OSs fit that bill, though Symbian currently remains the “800-pound gorilla,” according to McGregor.
“There is huge potential to re-examine the business model for all players” if open-source platforms become as widespread as In-Stat has forecasted, he added.
Android projections
In-Stat has forecast a 14% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for Symbian, with a 270% to 308% CAGR for Android, McGregor said, while noting that Symbian runs half the world’s smartphones and Android is starting from a “dead standstill.”
In-Stat forecasted that in three years, 97 million to 164 million handsets running Android will sell, with about 150 million units running Symbian sold – in other words, a neck-and-neck market. McGregor acknowledged that was the “most optimistic scenario” for Android.
But, “Symbian, from our perspective, is probably not the platform of choice for smartphones going forward,” the In-Stat technology strategist said. (Nokia has steadfastly defended its OS in the face of criticism that it is not “developer friendly.”)
Carriers in the OHA include T-Mobile USA, Sprint Nextel Corp., Vodafone, China Mobile, Telecom Italia, Telefonica, KDDI and NTT DoCoMo. AT&T Mobility has hinted it may come aboard. (Chip designers/vendors include Qualcomm Inc., Texas Instruments Inc., Intel Corp., Broadcom Corp., ARM, Marvell and Invidia, among others. Software companies include, of course, Android’s patron, the ever-feared Google, with eBay, Nuance and PacketVideo joining, among others.
As Android-related news was light to nonexistent at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this month, many pundits believe that the OS and its patrons will plan a splash at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona next month.
